A Demonic Hand
by zamtsina
Summary: He left us a long time ago and since I never knew him, I thought it would be better if I didn't have a father. But when he arrives, everything turns around.
1. Chapter 1

A Demonic Hand

Chapter 1

A girl walked into the kitchen where her mother was cooking the food and she asked her mother if she wanted any help but the mother insisted on serving her breakfast.

The girl sat at the table and her eyes looked to the photo frame, holding a picture of her father, the dark-haired boy and his cheeky grin from the times when her mother and father were still in junior high.

She reached to the photo then made it face down, hoping not to look at the man who left her and her mother when she was born; being left by her father at an early age, she didn't know anything about the man her mother continued to love and only had to trust the photos she saw and her mother's words.

Though she never met the man, she knew that she would hate him almost instantly from the way he was completely different from her; he was a man who liked to get into brawls, loud and she knew she would find him annoying.

She was an honor student, one of the smartest people in her batch and attending a private junior high school on a full scholarship, she hated men who constantly fought because of useless problems and she was annoyed by people who were too loud.

The woman who was a mother looked at the photo frame to find that her daughter had placed it face down, hiding his face and she felt guilt seep in.

She knew the reason why he left the two of them but telling her daughter _everything_, she worried that her daughter would soon be involved in something she would not be strong enough to face herself and she was glad that the old friends of her husband had promised to watch her daughter in case something happened to her.

Urameshi Keiko sat at her table with her daughter after handing Urameshi Kiyo her plate of pancakes and started on her own stack of pancakes. Kiyo reached to the syrup by her mother to reveal the strange birthmark on her hand in the shape of an arrow and soaked her pancakes with the maple syrup she loved having with her pancakes at breakfast.

Keiko giggled and Kiyo looked up, wondering what her mom was laughing at and Keiko answered her.

"You're so much like him, he used to enjoy my pancakes, too," Keiko covered her mouth instantly, knowing that it was dangerous when Keiko compared Kiyo and Yusuke. Kiyo stood up quickly, pushing the chair back so much that it almost fell and ran out of the kitchen and up the stairs, finally slamming he bedroom door loudly. Keiko sighed, looking to the photo frame and taking it, looking down at Yusuke's picture.

"Yusuke, hurry back, please; you're not leaving one person anymore," Keiko said, holding the frame close to herself, feeling the tears running down her face as she murmured 'that idiot' many times.

Kiyo sighed for the umpteenth time, frustrated over the fact that she had just made her mother cry again; she doesn't mean to hurt her mother but she gets so angry when other spoke about how similar her father and her were alike. She sipped on the iced tea as she looked outside the café window, watching as the many people passed her and seemed to have problems on their own.

She found a redhead standing there and a smile lit her face as she ran out of the café quickly but made sure to pay for it to meet up with the redhead who stood at the corner of the street, waiting for the proper time to cross the street. "Uncle Shuuichi!" The redhead turned at the familiar voice calling him and found the girl had walked up to him with a big smile. He smiled at the girl who he treated like a daughter as he had no kids of his own.

"Hi Kiyo-kun, what are you doing here?" Kiyo seemed saddened for a moment before answering that she wanted to have a bite so she went out to a café which served her favorite iced tea.

Kurama said that he would love to spend the rest of his day with Kiyo and Kiyo agreed to take him to many different places. As he led Kiyo to the parking lot where his car was, he glanced around to find the presence of the demons that were sent to protect her and he let himself enjoy as the girl was telling him about her adventures with her childhood friend, Kuwabara Yuki.

The doorbell rang and Keiko believed that it was her daughter since she promised to come back soon so she answered quickly. As she opened the door, she found a man instead of the young girl she was expecting and she moved to quickly close it until the man uttered her name with such a familiar voice, "Keiko…" Her eyes trembled as she opened the door to meet the brown eyes of her husband, "Yusuke?"

Kiyo rang the doorbell for the second time and glanced over her shoulder as thunder boomed. She opened the door's lock with her key and opened the door, calling for her mom but found that it was dark in the living room. Something clamped around Kiyo's wrist and she struggled to get free, calling for help as she found that it was a stranger from the way he told he to calm down.

Keiko entered the living room from the kitchen in a hurry and quickly opened the lights, switching them on to find Kiyo fighting off her very own father. "Yusuke, step away from her!" Yusuke let go instantly and Kiyo ran to her mother, hugging her as she cried, scared as to what that man had wanted with her. Keiko wrapped her arms around the little girl, "Now, now, Kiyo, don't worry, it's only your father."

Kiyo looked up at the man her mother had referred to as her father, the man's dark hair just like hers had grown long and tied back into a ponytail and he had grown some facial hair to show how much time he spent away from civilization. This was the man whom she hated, and the splitting image of herself; why was he here? And why was mom defending him? "Get away from this house!"


	2. Chapter 2

A Demonic Hand

Chapter 2

Keiko sighed as she set a cup of tea before Yusuke who sat at the table in the kitchen, thinking about her own daughter's reaction to her own father returning and the first thing she does was shout at him and tell him to leave.

She understood though, Keiko thought as she watched Yusuke drink the tea; she would react the same way towards her father if he left his wife and his daughter but she could not hurt Yusuke that way.

Yusuke put down his cup of tea on the table and looked to Keiko with a serious expression, "So, that was our daughter?" Keiko nodded with a smile, looking to the door of the kitchen, thinking about Kiyo sitting in her room with a stubborn expression, much like her very own father when he was stubborn about something. "She looks like me, a lot like me."

"You shouldn't say that around her, we got into a fight today just because I said you two were similar," Keiko said.

"Keiko, I'm sorry." Keiko shook her head.

"It's not your fault that you had to leave but Yusuke, you should understand that she doesn't want to see you now," Keiko said.

Yusuke went back to the time when her found out about his father and how much he was eager to see him which was different from the way his own daughter reacted, maybe she loved the life without her father and felt that he was going to interfere with the perfect life she preferred.

"Give her some time, Yusuke, she'll warm up to you, eventually."

Kiyo sat in her bedroom, going through her homework for school tomorrow and correcting her mistakes from what she could see but couldn't concentrate as the image of her father kept popping into her mind. She gripped the pencil so hard that she broke the pencil she held and threw it into the trash bin, getting rid of it.

She soon stood by her bed and fell back on it, letting her legs lie off the side of the bed as she looked up to the white ceiling of her room. She needed some sleep, she knew that but she couldn't stop thinking about her father, the same man who left her and her mother alone after she was born. When her mother would tell her stories about her father when she was younger, she would be in awe at how great her father was but it all changed when she entered grade school.

She was asked by her classmates where her father went and she answered that he left on the day she was born, then the friend looked on with pity saying that she was sorry. Her teachers found out about it and she classified that classmate of hers as a big blabber mouth. She was soon being bombarded by her teachers saying that she shouldn't feel as though she was abandoned and unwanted just because of that, her views changed as she realized that her father had abandoned her.

Kiyo could feel the tears running down her face again, just as they did every night when she was younger and she couldn't stop them so she simply wiped them away a few times before giving up and finally crying.

She was an unwanted child, an abandoned child and that was probably how her father saw her, a burden; she hated being a burden to her mother so she earned her own money by working a part-time job and studying well in hopes that she could pay her mother back.

"Stupid dad," she sobbed to herself. Then telling her she was an idiot for crying over such a dumb thing as her own father.

Kiyo walked down the stairs of her house but stopped as she saw the man she loathed sitting on the couch and watching the television. Their eyes met and she looked away almost instantly, she hated the fact that their eyes did appear to have the same color. She walked out of the living room and to the front door to put on her shoes.

Keiko walked out of the kitchen and saw her daughter sitting at the front door, fixing her shoes, "Kiyo, don't you want some breakfast? I made pancakes." Kiyo paused for a moment then shook her head and without anything else said, walked out of the house.

Kiyo arrived at the gate of her school when she heard a familiar voice calling her name and someone running towards her. She looked over her shoulder and found a boy from her school with his bright orange hair and unique red eyes from his mother and father and a cheeky grin on his face as he waved at her. She smiled and stopped, waiting for him to catch up; she needed a friend to cheer her up right now.

Yuki bent down, holding knees as he rushed to catch his breath from running to Kiyo when he was already tired from his morning jog with his uncle and catching his breath he smiled at Kiyo who greeted him a good morning and he returned it.

"Hey can you help me with the Chemistry homework?" Kiyo nodded and the two walked through the gates together, talking about their classmates and their teachers.

Kuwabara Yuki and Urameshi Kiyo were the best of friends, ever since childhood and Kiyo didn't mind that Yuki was noisy and very clumsy sometimes since she's grown to love it as though he were a puppy she bought; she would sometimes call him puppy when they were younger and he got angry over that name but it was all playful jokes.


	3. Chapter 3

A Demonic Hand

Chapter 3

Kiyo was writing down a formula for the different variables of the word problem her teacher had just given and the image of her father, _no, the man claiming to be her father_, popped into her mind.

She stopped copying the formula when the image was slowly distorted and formed her image, as though stating how alike they truly were.

The teacher looked up as she heard one of the chairs being pushed back as a student stood up from her seat and found that the class president had stood up, "What's wrong Urameshi-san?" Kiyo looked up to the teacher and sat back down, apologizing for her behavior. The teacher continued her discussion and teaching which variable belonged to which letter.

Yuki looked up at Kiyo after spitting the drink he just took a sip of and Kiyo was glad that she was sitting beside him because if she was sitting in front of him he would have spit on her. Kiyo had just told him about her father coming home yesterday.

"He really did? He came home?!" Kiyo nodded. "Wow, after all this time, he came home."

"It's stupid, really," Kiyo said as she took a sip of coffee from the can she held. "He comes to my home after being away for 14-15 years and expects me to greet him so happily, which is stupid." Yuki remembered the sad expression his father wore whenever Kiyo would come to visit as he remembered his dear old friend and comrade, but Yuki never knew at what.

"Maybe he…_really_ missed you?" Kiyo seemed to grow angrier as she crushed the can in her hand and Yuki was reminded of how strong her right hand really was.

For some reason, her right hand seemed to be able to break things, as though it were made of flexible steel. Yuki was the only one she told about this ability, she never told anyone else, even her own mother and her favorite uncle, Shuichi.

"Yuki, I never thought about having a father because I believed that he died a long time ago," Kiyo said, standing up from the bench and Yuki following her. The two stopped at the trash can, throwing their cans away. "I just think it strange to have the idea of a father, probably Uncle Shuichi is the closest thing I have to one."

The right moment she said that, the time when Shuichi was at the front door of the Urameshi residence where a girl he considered his daughter and a close friend lived in. He rang the doorbell once and Keiko's voice said that she was coming to the door to answer it. He waited for a moment when the door opened to reveal the brunette.

"Shuichi, please come in," Keiko said as he walked into the house. He stopped as he saw the figure that lay on the couch in the living room, wondering who it was for a moment when he saw the shaved face of the man, recognizing the man instantly as his comrade and friend from before. "Oh, he's asleep, Shuichi. I'm going to go prepare some food in the kit—SHUICHI! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" Shuichi was in the living room, running to the couch and punching the man in his sleep who yelped loudly in pain.

Yusuke sat upright, rubbing his cheek which his friend had strike with a strong and powerful punch. He looked up at the redhead who was now standing straight with a glare directed at him. "What is it, Kurama?" There was silence, broken as Shuichi shouted at Yusuke.

"You left Kiyo the moment she was born, HOW DO YOU THINK SHE FEELS ABOUT THAT?! BEING ABANDONED THE MOMENT SHE CAME TO BEING?!" Yusuke could only stare at his friend with a hopeless expression as Shuichi stood, shaking from fury and anger as his friend's stupid expression; had he not realized that this would happen even before then.

Kiyo stood by the payphone, the handset in her hand as she contemplated on who to call; could she call the house? _No, _he_ might answer._ Should I call Uncle Shuichi? _I'd be bothering him again, but he did say that I could call him anytime._

She dialed her uncle's number to his office and the secretary answered the phone after two rings, she stated who she was in the company and being the secretary of Minamino Shuichi. Kiyo stated who she was and asked if she could speak with her Uncle, the secretary said that he was not there and asked her to call his cellular phone. Kiyo thanked the secretary and put down the phone.

Kiyo asked Yuki if she could borrow his cell phone for a moment and he handed it to her with a smile. She quickly dialed her uncle's phone and waited for two rings until he finally answered. "Uncle Shuichi, I'm sleeping over at Yuki's house. Yes, don't worry, the Kuwabara's said they don't mind me coming over for dinner. Tell mother, Uncle Shuichi. Thanks. And I love you, Uncle Shuichi!" Kiyo flipped the phone close after Shuichi gave his reply of 'I love you, too' and ended their talk.

Yuki and Kiyo were walking to Yuki's house quietly as Yuki was licking the ice cream from the cone he held in his hand which they bought from a store they passed. Yuki looked to Kiyo, stopping for a moment then telling her, "You know that you'll have to go home eventually." Kiyo gave a nod, she knew that she'd have to meet her father at one point but she wasn't ready yet.

Yuki entered the house with the key he always held in his pants and Kiyo walked in after him, moving to carefully take her shoes off as Yuki carelessly threw them off. The two walked into the kitchen where Yuki's father was sitting at the island as his mother was by the stove, cooking something. Kazuma looked up when he heard him coming in and greeted his son, and seeing Kiyo welcomed her just like she was an addition to their family.

"Good evening, Uncle Kazuma, Aunt Yukina," Kiyo greeted with a bow. She took a seat beside Yuki who named after his mother at the island with Yuki's father and another dear uncle she was close to as she was to her Uncle Shuichi.

Yusuke looked up as Kurama flipped his phone off from across the table in the dining room, hearing the redhead saying 'I love you, too' over the phone? Who was he speaking to? Did he finally get a girlfriend? Or maybe even a wife already. Kurama took a sip of his coffee set by Keiko who was cooking at the stove, watching Yusuke over the rim of his cup. Yusuke broke the silence, "Who was that?" Kurama smirked as he set down his cup on the saucer, as though showing off.

"That was Kiyo," the redhead answered. Yusuke felt a spark of jealousy as he realized how close his friends were to his very own daughter, someone whom he didn't even know and might not get the chance to know. The girl seemed defensive against Yusuke and he only met her twice since he arrived back home. He found out that she was friends with the son of Kuwabara from the many pictures of the two as children and flashing wacky smiles at the person taking the picture. "Keiko, Kiyo's staying over at the Kuwabara's for the night! She said not to worry about anything!"

"Oh, okay then," Keiko's voice called from the kitchen and Yusuke wondered if it was such a normal thing for Kiyo to go over to the Kuwabara's and sleep-over.

"Yeah, it's a common thing," Kurama said, as though Yusuke had voiced his wonder aloud.


	4. Chapter 4

A Demonic Hand

Chapter 4

Kiyo sat in the bedroom she used whenever she stayed over at the Kuwabara's, combing her long hair so it wasn't messy when she woke up the next morning. She placed the brush on the bedside table and lay back on the bed, her legs hanging off the bed. She turned on her side and watched the door.

* * *

Kuwabara knew why she was staying over, Keiko had called earlier today and told him that Yusuke had arrived home yesterday. It was stupid, really; that idiot left and he comes home as though expecting a great welcome from his very own daughter whom he had never met. He picked up the remote and pressed the power button and turned the television off. He stood up and looked to the photo of his son and Kiyo, younger with big smiles and he himself in the photo.

Yukina had taken a picture of that when they were younger and the frame, he remembers was a gift from Kiyo on father's day. He accepted it because he was a fatherly figure in her life, he knew that very well when she asked him if she could call him dad from then on but as she grew older, she started to stop that habit, as though realizing that she didn't have a father.

Kuwabara made his way up the stairs and to his bedroom down the hall.

* * *

A pair of red eyes watched from a tree outside of the room of the girl who lay fast asleep in her bed, tucked away by her uncle when he came into the room just a moment ago. The creature's grin exposed its sharp fangs that could pierce the hardest type of metal and it's claws, gripping the branch of the tree it stood on similar to his teeth. The lights were turned off so it was the right time to move.

* * *

The creature jumped off the branch and entered the room through the window, his figure passed through the glass, not breaking it as though nothing had come into her room that moment. The creature stood by the bed and looked down at the girl, raising his arms in hopes of giving the girl a quick death and quickly devouring her.

As though sensing the movement, the girl's eyes slowly opened but as she met the horrible and disfigured face of the creature, she opened her mouth to call for help but the creature covered her mouth with its large hand. She felt the tears then as the creature opened its mouth before her, as though trying to swallow her whole and she shook her head, hoping to awaken from the dream.

She raised her hand with the strange birthmark and hit the creature away, the monster falling back unto the floor and she let out the scream she planned on letting go a while ago. Another figure appeared from the window, shattering it but more human to the eyes of Kiyo and she briefly could not recognize who it was. "Uncle Hiei!" He stood, now as tall as the fox when they had entered the Dark Tournament but he maintained his gravity-defying hair and sharp facial features.

He held his sword up and sliced down at the monster, killing it instantly as the creature stayed on the floor, the blood pooling at Hiei's feet and the floor. Kiyo's back had hit the wall as her uncle raised the sword and as she saw the blood, she felt faint. The door flew open and Yuki in a t-shirt and shorts entered the room with his parents behind him, wondering what had happened to Kiyo.

Kiyo saw them and felt the faintness hit her head-on and falling to the side, losing consciousness then.

* * *

Kurama stood by the door of the Urameshi household, being escorted by Yusuke when his cellular phone rang. He looked at the name briefly then answered it, waiting for the person to tell him what had happened and his eyes widened at hearing in Yuki's voice what had happened, "WHAT?! KIYO'S HURT?! I'm coming right over." He flipped his phone off and Yusuke took a moment to realize it was about his daughter. Kurama and Yusuke's gazes met and they gave a nod, as though knowing what the other was thinking.

They were soon both seen in the same car, Kurama driving in the direction of the Kuwabara household.

* * *

Yuki entered the living room where the adults sat, keeping quiet about what had happened. Uncle Kurama and a stranger had entered the room, as he saw a while ago and wondered who the stranger was. As he looked up at the man, he suddenly saw that Kiyo was a splitting image of the man and knew who it was, the man whom she greatly detested, her very own father.

Kurama looked up as Yuki entered and stood to meet the young boy who was the best friend of the girl whom he had been worrying over, "Yuki, is she alright? Did she get hurt?" Yuki shook his head, answering that she was just upstairs in his room with Uncle Hiei guarding just in case something else would happen. Kurama sighed and settled back on the chair, Yusuke looking at the redhead and jealous that he was so worried over someone else's daughter, his to be exact.

"Yusuke," Kuwabara called him, knowing that his best friend was keeping something to himself; "Do you know why a demon attacked her?" Yusuke looked up at Kuwabara and decided that it was time for him to come out and say what had caused him to leave when she was born, also the reason that a demon had attacked an innocent human. Yuki looked on between his father and Kiyo's father, then stopped at his father.

"Dad, what are you talking about? Demons? There are no such things." Kuwabara looked on apologetically to Yukina and gestured for her to tell their son their secret long kept. "Mom?"

"Yuki, I am a demon and so in your Uncle Hiei," Yukina said to her son gently. Yuki couldn't believe it, his whole family was made of demons? Then that meant, that since his mother was a demon, that meant that…_he was ONE, too!_ He ran out of the room, Yukina calling to him but Kuwabara said that Yuki needed some time to take-in all of this new information. "Alright, he probably went up to his room to stay with Kiyo."

"Yusuke, before anything else happens, what was the reason for Kiyo being targeted by a demon?"

"The reason I left when she was born was because I was afraid that she would get involved in all of this, the stuff that I left when I came back here after the tournament for the kings of Makai," he said, and a fter a moment of silence continued as though thinking of what to say next. "Kiyo is my daughter and you know how many demons, even people are looking for revenge for whatever I did to them, especially those from the tournaments. There are many out there looking for her, looking to kill her." Kurama stood up.

"Why didn't you tell us before?! She would've gotten hurt without Hiei here to protect her at that moment! What if he wasn't here?!" Yusuke looked up at him and shook his head.

"Before I left, you remember the many allies we made during those tournaments? They were here to protect her, even while I wasn't here those many years, so even without Hiei there, she would've been safe," Yusuke explained nonchalantly. Kurama was frustrated at how he sounded so sure of himself. "I'm afraid that those people I've asked to protect her aren't strong enough, especially against the new enemy."

"Who is this?" Kuwabara asked him.

"It's the son of Yomi, Shura," Yusuke said.

"What?! Do you know how powerful his son is now?! If he was strong when he was a child, he's probably much stronger now after how many years of training," Kurama said. Kuwabara asked him to explain who Shura was and how he was related to this revenge plot everyone had against Yusuke. Kurama explained how he was a clone of Yomi but raised as the purpose of a weapon, to go against Yusuke if he was to lose. "Yusuke, what're you going to do?"

"I'm sending her to train with Genkai," Yusuke said simply, as though he had no other choice, and he really didn't, the others knew this. "Genkai said that she would train her, and she was glad she wasn't training another blockhead like me. Genkai also said that she would train Yuki."

"What?" Yukina gripped the sleeve of her husband beside her.

"Why does _my_ son have to train, too? He was never involved in any of this!"

"Kuwabara, he's a half-demon, too, you know? I was strong because of my training but it was also because of my demonic blood that I had fought and won against many opponents," Yusuke explained.

"Do you really think he would reject the idea of helping Kiyo?" Kurama said.

All was silent.

* * *

Her eyes blinked open and when she saw the blue ceiling of the room, she knew she was not in her guest room of the Kuwabara household. Someone from her side called her name and her gaze moved to the boy who sat by her bed, apparently glad to see that she was okay. Kiyo smiled as she recognized the boy instantly, "Yuki."

"I'm glad you're okay." He found her attempting to sit-up then wincing, clutching her head, "Don't! Your body still needs rest probably." Kiyo lay back down and closed her eyes, finally remembering the demon that had entered her room and her uncle attacking the demon.

Kiyo knew it had something to do with her father since everything was fine until he arrived, that she was normal and…nothing was wrong, everything was right.

"Kiyo? Why are you crying?" Kiyo opened her eyes and found them clouded with her tears, she reached up and wiped them away but they kept coming. She sat upright, crying more as she realized that nothing about her was normal; she had no father to teach her everything he knew, to fight off the boys coming close to her, she had her uncles for everything but she rejected him as soon as she found out that the stranger had been her father.

She found herself pulled to the side and her face met the chest of her best friend. "It's going to be alright, I promise, I'll protect you," Yuki said. Kiyo reached up and gripped his shirt as she sobbed into his chest, hoping that everything would stay still, that nothing else would happen to her or her best friend.

_Why did he have to come back after so long? Why did he even want to leave the moment I was born? Was I really that unloved?_

She cried even harder as she came to that realization.


End file.
